Guest NorthoftheBorder Posted December 8, 2011 Share Posted December 8, 2011 Boise State, San Diego State, Houston, SMU and UCF will join the Big East Conference in 2013, sources told CBSSports.com. Boise State and San Diego State will join the Big East as football-only members, while Houston, SMU and UCF will join as all-sport members. Boise State is expected to put its non-football sports in the WAC, while San Diego State would place its non-football sports in the Big West, sources told CBSSports.com. http://brett-mcmurphy.blogs.cbssports.com/mcc/blogs/entry/29532522/33728643 It is crazy enough for Houston & SMU to be in the Big East, but SDSU and Boise? That is some serious travel. May need to change the name to Big East-West Conference. Looks like the WAC may become a non football conference with as many non football playing schools as the one's who play football. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coachacola Posted December 8, 2011 Share Posted December 8, 2011 The WAC commissioner is holding a press conference today, probably to talk about Boise State joining for all sports except football. I'm hoping the Sun Belt has a spot for Lamar in a couple of years because the WAC is getting uglier by the day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodsn4 Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 There was a post on the Scout WAC board that stated that the eastern WAC schools only voted for Boise State because they were promised another eastern team for balance. If true, Lamar may be on the top of the WAC list. This would put the WAC at 12 members with 2 divisions of 6 and 8 football members with UTA adding football by 2015 or 2016. Then the WAC can court either the Montana's or 2 other Big Sky members over the next few years to go to a 14 team conference with a football only member in California for a 12 team football conference. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coachacola Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 There was a post on the Scout WAC board that stated that the eastern WAC schools only voted for Boise State because they were promised another eastern team for balance. If true, Lamar may be on the top of the WAC list. This would put the WAC at 12 members with 2 divisions of 6 and 8 football members with UTA adding football by 2015 or 2016. Then the WAC can court either the Montana's or 2 other Big Sky members over the next few years to go to a 14 team conference with a football only member in California for a 12 team football conference. First, thanks for joining goodsn4. Sounds like the two Montana schools are tied at the hip and they are not ready (or willing) to jump to the WAC. I'm not convinced anymore that Lamar wants to jump to the WAC either with all the uncertainty out there, but if La Tech, Texas State and UTSA are staying in the WAC then Lamar would probably accept if invited. Travel for football wouldn't be that bad with only 2 trips a year out west. With only 7 conference games then Lamar could schedule a couple of money games and a few non-conference home games a year and not go broke. Basketball would definitely be a step up with the likes of Utah State, New Mexico State and Boise State. If the WAC could become a top 10 basketball conference (like the Missouri Valley or Mountain West) then I could see Pat Knight staying longer at Lamar than if we're stuck in SLC. I like this setup: East La Tech Lamar UTSA TXST *UTA *Denver West New Mexico State Idaho Utah State San Jose State *Seattle *Boise State Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TBonesLU Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 Could someone explain to me how travel partners work? As I understood it before, teams travel on their own to the opponent's site. Is that not correct? Do they share planes? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coachacola Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 Could someone explain to me how travel partners work? As I understood it before, teams travel on their own to the opponent's site. Is that not correct? Do they share planes? It's the opposite of that. For example, Idaho and Boise State would be travel partners so Lamar would fly the basketball team to Boise and play Boise State on Thursday and then the University of Idaho on Saturday then fly back. One flight takes care of two games. Edit: Actually, looking at google maps, Boise State and Utah State would be travel partners while Idaho and Seattle U would be travel partners. SJSU is all alone in California. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TBonesLU Posted December 12, 2011 Share Posted December 12, 2011 Could someone explain to me how travel partners work? As I understood it before, teams travel on their own to the opponent's site. Is that not correct? Do they share planes? It's the opposite of that. For example, Idaho and Boise State would be travel partners so Lamar would fly the basketball team to Boise and play Boise State on Thursday and then the University of Idaho on Saturday then fly back. One flight takes care of two games. Edit: Actually, looking at google maps, Boise State and Utah State would be travel partners while Idaho and Seattle U would be travel partners. SJSU is all alone in California. So am I correct in assuming that travel partners per se don't really exist in the SLC? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goodsn4 Posted December 13, 2011 Share Posted December 13, 2011 Conferences with a small footprint, such as the Southland, do not need travel pertners to survive. The WAC is too spread out to not have travel partners to keep travel costs down on its members. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
geezer Posted December 13, 2011 Share Posted December 13, 2011 I think you will see some form of travel partnering with the addition of ORU. I see ORU and UCA as a single road trip for A&MCC, I can see Nichols and SELA as a single road trip for ORU & UCA. If the conference will move to say a Saturday Tuesday BB schedule then ORU could go to Nicholls for a Saturday game and SELA on Tuesday while minimizing time away from classes. UCA would make the opposite trip the same weekend. Just a couple of examples. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigRedTrack Posted December 13, 2011 Share Posted December 13, 2011 I think you will see some form of travel partnering with the addition of ORU. I see ORU and UCA as a single road trip for A&MCC, I can see Nichols and SELA as a single road trip for ORU & UCA. If the conference will move to say a Saturday Tuesday BB schedule then ORU could go to Nicholls for a Saturday game and SELA on Tuesday while minimizing time away from classes. UCA would make the opposite trip the same weekend. Just a couple of examples. Since when is the conference concerned about the player's grades. Just keep them eligible & hope they can graduate within 6 years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TexGator Posted December 28, 2011 Share Posted December 28, 2011 I think you will see some form of travel partnering with the addition of ORU. I see ORU and UCA as a single road trip for A&MCC, I can see Nichols and SELA as a single road trip for ORU & UCA. If the conference will move to say a Saturday Tuesday BB schedule then ORU could go to Nicholls for a Saturday game and SELA on Tuesday while minimizing time away from classes. UCA would make the opposite trip the same weekend. Just a couple of examples. Since when is the conference concerned about the player's grades. Just keep them eligible & hope they can graduate within 6 years. Did you really just say that? They're STUDENTS first and foremost. Staying eligible is important for the program, but they need to take care of the classroom and not settle for C's and D's. My favorite Cardinal of the last 15 years is Matt Sundblad... and most of that was because he was even better in the classroom than he was in leading the country in FT%. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest CardAmbassador Posted December 29, 2011 Share Posted December 29, 2011 I think you will see some form of travel partnering with the addition of ORU. I see ORU and UCA as a single road trip for A&MCC, I can see Nichols and SELA as a single road trip for ORU & UCA. If the conference will move to say a Saturday Tuesday BB schedule then ORU could go to Nicholls for a Saturday game and SELA on Tuesday while minimizing time away from classes. UCA would make the opposite trip the same weekend. Just a couple of examples. Since when is the conference concerned about the player's grades. Just keep them eligible & hope they can graduate within 6 years. Did you really just say that? They're STUDENTS first and foremost. Staying eligible is important for the program, but they need to take care of the classroom and not settle for C's and D's. My favorite Cardinal of the last 15 years is Matt Sundblad... and most of that was because he was even better in the classroom than he was in leading the country in FT%. tex. I believe brt was speaking facetiously about conference priorities. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Crawfish Posted January 4, 2012 Share Posted January 4, 2012 Rumor has it that La Tech will finally get their invitation to join C-USA next summer. If true, this creates some interesting questions: 1. Will the WAC survive as a football Conference? My guess is no 2. What will happen to NMSU and UTSA? My guess is both will join the Belt. 3. What will happen to Idaho? My guess is they drop back to FCS. Other predictions for conference reallignment in the new year: UALR announces departure from the SBC. ULM begins process of moving back to FCS. (budget issues loom big there) Sunbelt expansion will allow for a conference championship game. Sunbelt adds 1 more Bowl along with additional teams (Alamo?) Anyway, all of the above is speculation, but I suspect that there is some truth to the La. Tech rumor. It is also a fact that ULM is getting further and further behind the budget race in the SBC. This could be an interesting year. IMHO, if LU wants a shot at an invite to the SBC, the athletic budget needs to be closer to 20 million than 10. All belt teams are ramping up (except ULM.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TexGator Posted January 6, 2012 Share Posted January 6, 2012 Rumor has it that La Tech will finally get their invitation to join C-USA next summer. If true, this creates some interesting questions: 1. Will the WAC survive as a football Conference? My guess is no 2. What will happen to NMSU and UTSA? My guess is both will join the Belt. 3. What will happen to Idaho? My guess is they drop back to FCS. Other predictions for conference reallignment in the new year: UALR announces departure from the SBC. ULM begins process of moving back to FCS. (budget issues loom big there) Sunbelt expansion will allow for a conference championship game. Sunbelt adds 1 more Bowl along with additional teams (Alamo?) Anyway, all of the above is speculation, but I suspect that there is some truth to the La. Tech rumor. It is also a fact that ULM is getting further and further behind the budget race in the SBC. This could be an interesting year. IMHO, if LU wants a shot at an invite to the SBC, the athletic budget needs to be closer to 20 million than 10. All belt teams are ramping up (except ULM.) I don't think you're off-base at all... I think that attendance at games (particularly basketball and football games) is the biggest key to a move up. Right now we have "pretty good attendance for the Southland", but there's a big difference between "pretty good attendance for the Southland" and "sufficient attendance for an FBS Conference" (even if the standard for CUSA and the WAC is slipping with U of H moving to the Big East and all the other shifting). If we start selling out both sides of The PUS for all games, then we'll get some attention. (oh yeah, and not getting outmatched in a majority of conference football games would help, too) Rice's endowment is the only thing that keeps them in the FBS... we probably won't have $4B in the bank any time soon, so we need to build the resume through either athletic achievement or packing the stands. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Crawfish Posted January 6, 2012 Share Posted January 6, 2012 One of the advantages Lamar has is its past affiliation with the SBC. I think that Lamar still enjoys a good relationship with (and rivalry in baseball and basketball) with some of the Sunbelt schools. I think attendance is important as well as a commitment budget wise to athletics. Lamar has pretty good facilities. I think the stadium, although very nice, would ultimately need to be expanded. Another way to view that is if Lamar is selling out or getting near capacity crowds now, and no expansion occurred, then there would be virtually no financial benefit to moving up in division. Too many of those "rent a win" payoffs are hard on a mid major player in FBS, so that much of the revenue ideally would be made from home games. The SBC has mandated that its members have at least 6 home games a year every other year. When you consider conference road games, this does not allow for more than 1 or 2 payday games. Ideally a mid-major would schedule 1 or 2 payday games, and 1 or 2 non-conference home and home opponents from another non-AQ league and perhaps 1 FCS game every other year. Anyway, the business plan has to work with all of the league requirements. Sorry for such a long post, but I enjoy discussing this conference realignment and I follow it pretty close, especially the mid-majors. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
midnite Posted January 17, 2012 Share Posted January 17, 2012 What's the latest on the WAC expansion ?? Wondering if Lamar is considering moving up... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coachacola Posted January 17, 2012 Share Posted January 17, 2012 What's the latest on the WAC expansion ?? Wondering if Lamar is considering moving up... No clue. We'll probably know a lot more after CUSA/MWC figure out what they'll do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Crawfish Posted January 17, 2012 Share Posted January 17, 2012 What's the latest on the WAC expansion ?? Wondering if Lamar is considering moving up... The most consistent rumor has La. Tech joining C-USA. IMO, this will be the final nail in the coffin for the WAC as a football conference. Should be interesting to watch, but the C-USA and MWC merger meetings were to be held this past weekend. Having said that, the merger will wait for the MWC to officially get turned down for AQ status. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TexGator Posted January 18, 2012 Share Posted January 18, 2012 The move up would guarantee a bigger budget, but it would require some huge expenses. So, if we're going to make the move, we need people to write some big checks to get the stadium expanded... and then fill the stadium EVERY GAME. A 35,000-seat stadium doesn't do us any good if there are only 15,000 tickets sold. So, get your checkbooks out and buy 2... 4... maybe 10 season tickets for 2012. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdcurran235 Posted January 20, 2012 Share Posted January 20, 2012 I wonder how long until the WAC is talking to both LU and SHSU. It looks more and more like the MWC-CUSA merger is going to be for football only, so at most LaTech is added but probably noone. The Rival TV contract with BSC will prevent any CA schools from going to the WAC. No other D1A schools are going to the WAC. It is looking more and more like Texas is the only option. If they add us and SHSU, the cost increase will be incremental with all the texas / Louisiana teams and I dont really see any other choices for the WAC. Then if later UTA adds football that gives a nice even 10 football playing members. Although LU would much prefer the SBC, I think the WAC is going to come crawling to us first. They may have no other options the way things appear to be going now in realignment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
geezer Posted January 20, 2012 Share Posted January 20, 2012 UTA dropped football after the 1985 season, wonder what the real chances are they will restart the program? Any idea what their athletic budget is like? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coachacola Posted January 20, 2012 Share Posted January 20, 2012 I read somewhere that UTA may announce this spring that they are bringing back football. Their current budget is pretty low at around $8 million, but they have a large student body so they could raise that pretty easily like Texas State and UTSA have. I think Lamar is still in the mix depending on how things shake out, and there's nothing wrong with staying FCS for another year or two. I'd hate for Lamar to join the WAC and then it falls apart. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdcurran235 Posted January 20, 2012 Share Posted January 20, 2012 I am not as determined as I once was for fbs. But if shsu and lu go together I am definitely for a move to the WAC. And the way things are looking now it seems very possible. But I am worried about the WAC falling apart. But if the conference becomes texcentric I think it has a real shot of survival. Which coinsides with some of the banter I have been hearing on college boards. I think even the fans on the wacboard are starting to realise this as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bearkat25 Posted January 21, 2012 Share Posted January 21, 2012 I have to be honest with you guys I have become a pro-FCS fan. Before this wonderful football season I wanted SHSU to go FBS at all costs but after this season I realized I would rather be an FCS power than a bottom feeder FBS. We had 3 games on ESPN and 3 football games on FSN. Most schools in the WAC can’t even boast that. Our AD has made it clear that we want to go FBS at some point but we are in NO rush. Coach Fritz had this to say in the Huntsville Item,“I told our guys many times that I want people to talk about Sam Houston the way they talk about Georgia Southern, Appalachian State, North Dakota State and Montana. That’s what we’re looking for. In order to do that, there’s some areas we’ve got to improve in and do better.” http://itemonline.com/sports/x1267393988/Sam-Houston-State-football-Gearing-up-for-2012 Plus we have plenty of work to do with facilities. We are finally breaking ground on the event center this year, expanding chair backs, and replacing the scoreboard. Bottom line: Fritz wants to be here, we have a young talented team and we want to be the Montana of the south. We expect record ticket sales next year too. The WAC is not stable so it’s best to stay put, and that means LU as well. This is the time for LU to win games and build that young football program. Once you guys start to win I can see LU and SHSU becoming the new hot twins that the FBS conferences want ala Montana twins. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bearkat25 Posted January 21, 2012 Share Posted January 21, 2012 Here is the pre-national championship SHSU chalk talk straight from Bobby Williams. Fast forward to 12:07. FBS is the 800 pound gorilla that makes our athletic director a little nervous to talk about. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Um74sedoCcE Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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